Version 1.80.5 critique.

Okay here we go with a small 1.80.5 overview.

I’ve played through Mars since the release of 1.80.5 and I am loving the new tweeks, but there are still some balance issues and strategy issues.

While turrets now discriminate between targets they can hurt and those they cannot, the droids still do not. In many cases they just sit in one spot as a large armored Titan just runs them over while focusing all their fire power at it. I also noticed the advanced battle droids still cannot hurt the armored titans except by firing literally hundreds of blasts at it. Your update said they had armor piercing rounds, but I’m not really seeing its effect.

There is a weapon balance issue with the disrupters. They are still too powerful. A combination of two or three with a few powerups near the base just destroys everything, which also adds to the legitimacy of swarming the base with guns. Playing through, the best strategy still leans towards cramming your base with guns.

I’ve been thinking about the base guns strategy issue and they only thing I could see that would solve the issue is to decrease turret power further, keep the Titans the same or increase their power, and decrease the price of the turrets further. Make turrets and powerups so weak and so cheap that the only way to damage a Titan enough by the time he gets to your base is fire at him all along the way.

Another issue that needs to be addressed is the end stage mining exploit where you delay the last titan long enough with barricades to mine all the resources. This is a tough issue, but I have a possible solution. How about preventing the addition of turrets, bombs, barricades, etc. after the red bar timer in the upper right hand corner has expired. By the time this timer expires, all the titans are pretty much dead by this point and only a few remain. Any defenses you’ve put up should be sufficient to take care of them and if not you didn’t do a good job anyways, and this would prevent the end stage mining exploit completely.

I love the powerdown of the bezerk powerup. It made boss fights so easy back in earlier versions. The loss of one tile of powerup range has increase the tendency to spread out effectively, but not entirely.

I saw some people are having difficulties with the powerup pickup time, however, I didn’t seem to have any problems and I’ve only missed one to date.

Overall a fantastic update. I love the progress this game has made and I am looking forward to more.